White Food

Poetry. Honest, heartfelt and unflinching, the poems in WHITE FOOD make a compelling journey through a life-cycle that will resonate with readers, enlarging their perceptions of their own life experiences. Piquant portraits of childhood and adolescence, family relationships, the vicissitudes of marriage and divorce, losing parents to dementia and cancer, and the challenges of the author's own aging—all are conveyed not only with deep feeling but also with keen insight, moxie and wit. Music, art and nature figure significantly in many of these poems, and there is much to amuse and surprise as well as to move the reader deeply. WHITE FOOD is Toni Mergentime Levi's third book of poems and the second to be published by Mayapple Press.

"A wonderful book! In this lovely and affecting collection, Levi's poetic stories take us on a life- long journey, wherein the stewardship of time, memory, humanity and love passes from one generation to another, challenging each of us as we travel on. It may, indeed, be darkness that lies at the end of our journey, but as Levi suggests, we are sustained by the hope that some essential trace of who we are and those we've loved will survive."—Eleanor Lerman

"Musical, insightful, Toni Levi's collection is filled with poems of grace and offbeat discernment. With joy I salute the maturity and depth of her work."—Colette Inez

"Toni Levi's poetry has grace, intelligence, delicate feeling and wit. Her clear voice can be heard in all she writes."—Molly Peacock

"The often lyrical, always personal pieces in WATCHING MOTHER DISAPPEAR match the long, pitch-perfect title poem in quality of thought, clarity of expression and depth of feeling."—Thaddeus Rutkowski